New Empress Chinese Cuisine — Restaurant in Kelowna

BUYER BE WARNED!!! This restaurant has the absolutely worst service and management!!! I placed an order shortly after 5 on a Friday evening, after hearing it would be a 75 minute wait I was extremely understand as it was the first snowfall and they were probably very busy. An hour and a half passed and became a little frustrated at the situation. I called back and was told my food was on its way by a rather rude girl. I live only a short 5 minute drive from the restaurant so I accepted it would be there any moment. Half an hour later my food finally arrived. Excited to finally eat we were sorely disappointed to find almond chicken that was so over cooked we couldn't even stick a fork into it and on top of that it was all extremely cold. Very upset we heated our supposedly "fresh food" and the four of us ate what we could. An entire household then spent the whole night in the bathrooms throwing up from food poisoning, which then continued all of Saturday. Angry and sick, I called the restaurant. After numerous attempts and messages a very angry lady called me back. I apologized for bothering her and began explaining my frustrations. Shortly into the story she began yelling at me, telling me I was wrong and that my food was not cold. I insisted it was but she continued to tell me she knew best. She completely ignored the fact that they had made an entire household extremely ill and told me it was my fault for eating to much. Extremely frusterated I demanded my money back, all she offered me was 15% off my next order. As I was extensively dissatisfied by the entire restaurant and service, I insisted I would never return and wanted my money back. She completely blew the entire situation off, acting as though they had done nothing wrong. The worst service I've ever experience and I definitely discourage anyone from eating here!!! This place is only...

My boyfriend and I came here for lunch and to my surprise, the restaurant was empty, I've seen this place at night and I might have seen three or four tables being used. I've read a few of the reviews and I didn't think this place was all that bad, there aren't a lot of Chinese restaurants in Rutland. When we came in, the waitress told us to pick a place to sit and handed us menus, which were the paper ordering pamphlets, not a good sign. It took us a good while to decide and she kept bothering asking us what we wanted to order. The restaurant was empty, there was no need to rush anybody. When we finally decided, we ordered the chicken chow mein. While we were waiting, I was watching how the waitress conversed with a customer that showed up to do the buffet, unfortunately, because they were not busy enough, they couldn't hold the buffet and she kept pushing the meal for one or four on him. He eventually left, not satisfied. Our food finally arrived, it was very salty and the chicken didn't look cooked, only because they boil their chicken first, before adding it to the chow mein, so it barely had time to brown and take in the sauce from the wok. The onions weren't cooked and there were a few vegetables that seemed like that they didn't belong there.

Not...

Food was good and portion size was what we expected (not small). We ordered a single combination B and E less than 1hr before closing time and hubby and I split the combos between each other. I have to say the chicken balls and almond chicken was a bit dry (definitely needs sauce to eat) which is why the 4 stars instead of 5. HOWEVER, one of the best food for everything else. The ginger beef and sweet and sour pork was light and crispy and well sauced (and not soggy) and the meat was tender and juicy. Everything had loads of flavour and the 2 combinations was more food than we could eat. Our family get together usually consists of ordering a dinner for 8 (for 11 people) at another very well known Asian restaurant on hwy 97 but we definitely will be passing along ordering the dinner for 8 here next time and see how they fair. Will definitely be ordering here again. By the way I lived many years in Ottawa so I've had real Cantonese food and from what we've tried this is the closest one I've tried in Kelowna. Sorry no photos because it was too good to stop long enough...